The location of the parent project, if one exists. Values from the parent
project will be the default for this project if they are left unspecified. The location
is given as a group ID, artifact ID and version.

groupId

String

A universally unique identifier for a project. It is normal to
use a fully-qualified package name to distinguish it from other
projects with a similar name (eg. org.apache.maven).

artifactId

String

The identifier for this artifact that is unique within the group given by the
group ID. An artifact is something that is either produced or used by a project.
Examples of artifacts produced by Maven for a project include: JARs, source and binary
distributions, and WARs.

version

String

The current version of the artifact produced by this project.

packaging

String

The type of artifact this project produces, for example jarwarearpom.
Plugins can create their own packaging, and
therefore their own packaging types,
so this list does not contain all possible types.
Default value is: jar.

name

String

The full name of the project.

description

String

A detailed description of the project, used by Maven whenever it needs to
describe the project, such as on the web site. While this element can be specified as
CDATA to enable the use of HTML tags within the description, it is discouraged to allow
plain text representation. If you need to modify the index page of the generated web
site, you are able to specify your own instead of adjusting this text.

url

String

The URL to the project's homepage.

inceptionYear

String

The year of the project's inception, specified with 4 digits. This value is
used when generating copyright notices as well as being informational.

(Many)
This element describes all of the licenses for this project.
Each license is described by a license element, which
is then described by additional elements.
Projects should only list the license(s) that applies to the project
and not the licenses that apply to dependencies.
If multiple licenses are listed, it is assumed that the user can select
any of them, not that they must accept all.

Default dependency information for projects that inherit from this one. The
dependencies in this section are not immediately resolved. Instead, when a POM derived
from this one declares a dependency described by a matching groupId and artifactId, the
version and other values from this section are used for that dependency if they were not
already specified.

(Many)
This element describes all of the dependencies associated with a
project.
These dependencies are used to construct a classpath for your
project during the build process. They are automatically downloaded from the
repositories defined in this project.
See the
dependency mechanism for more information.

This element includes the specification of report plugins to use
to generate the reports on the Maven-generated site.
These reports will be run when a user executes mvn site.
All of the reports will be included in the navigation bar for browsing.

(Many) A listing of project-local build profiles which will modify the build process
when activated.

parent

The <parent> element contains information required to locate the parent project from which
this project will inherit from.
Note: The children of this element are not interpolated and must be given as literal values.

Element

Type

Description

artifactId

String

The artifact id of the parent project to inherit from.

groupId

String

The group id of the parent project to inherit from.

version

String

The version of the parent project to inherit.

relativePath

String

The relative path of the parent pom.xml file within the check out.
If not specified, it defaults to ../pom.xml.
Maven looks for the parent POM first in this location on
the filesystem, then the local repository, and lastly in the remote repo.
relativePath allows you to select a different location,
for example when your structure is flat, or deeper without an intermediate parent POM.
However, the group ID, artifact ID and version are still required,
and must match the file in the location given or it will revert to the repository for the POM.
This feature is only for enhancing the development in a local checkout of that project.
Set the value to an empty string in case you want to disable the feature and always resolve
the parent POM from the repositories.
Default value is: ../pom.xml.

organization

Specifies the organization that produces this project.

Element

Type

Description

name

String

The full name of the organization.

url

String

The URL to the organization's home page.

license

Describes the licenses for this project. This is used to generate the license
page of the project's web site, as well as being taken into consideration in other reporting
and validation. The licenses listed for the project are that of the project itself, and not
of dependencies.

Element

Type

Description

name

String

The full legal name of the license.

url

String

The official url for the license text.

distribution

String

The primary method by which this project may be distributed.

repo

may be downloaded from the Maven repository

manual

user must manually download and install the dependency.

comments

String

Addendum information pertaining to this license.

developer

Information about one of the committers on this project.

Element

Type

Description

id

String

The unique ID of the developer in the SCM.

name

String

The full name of the contributor.

email

String

The email address of the contributor.

url

String

The URL for the homepage of the contributor.

organization

String

The organization to which the contributor belongs.

organizationUrl

String

The URL of the organization.

roles/role*

List<String>

(Many)
The roles the contributor plays in the project. Each role is described by a
role element, the body of which is a role name. This can also be used to
describe the contribution.

timezone

String

The timezone the contributor is in. Typically, this is a number in the range
-12 to +14
or a valid time zone id like "America/Montreal" (UTC-05:00) or "Europe/Paris" (UTC+01:00).

properties/key=value*

Properties

(Many) Properties about the contributor, such as an instant messenger handle.

contributor

Description of a person who has contributed to the project, but who does not have
commit privileges. Usually, these contributions come in the form of patches submitted.

Element

Type

Description

name

String

The full name of the contributor.

email

String

The email address of the contributor.

url

String

The URL for the homepage of the contributor.

organization

String

The organization to which the contributor belongs.

organizationUrl

String

The URL of the organization.

roles/role*

List<String>

(Many)
The roles the contributor plays in the project. Each role is described by a
role element, the body of which is a role name. This can also be used to
describe the contribution.

timezone

String

The timezone the contributor is in. Typically, this is a number in the range
-12 to +14
or a valid time zone id like "America/Montreal" (UTC-05:00) or "Europe/Paris" (UTC+01:00).

properties/key=value*

Properties

(Many) Properties about the contributor, such as an instant messenger handle.

mailingList

This element describes all of the mailing lists associated with a project. The
auto-generated site references this information.

Element

Type

Description

name

String

The name of the mailing list.

subscribe

String

The email address or link that can be used to subscribe to
the mailing list. If this is an email address, a
mailto: link will automatically be created
when the documentation is created.

unsubscribe

String

The email address or link that can be used to unsubscribe to
the mailing list. If this is an email address, a
mailto: link will automatically be created
when the documentation is created.

post

String

The email address or link that can be used to post to
the mailing list. If this is an email address, a
mailto: link will automatically be created
when the documentation is created.

archive

String

The link to a URL where you can browse the mailing list archive.

otherArchives/otherArchive*

List<String>

(Many) The link to alternate URLs where you can browse the list archive.

prerequisites

Describes the prerequisites a project can have.

Element

Type

Description

maven

String

The minimum version of Maven required to build the project, or to use this
plugin.Default value is: 2.0.

scm

The <scm> element contains informations required to the SCM
(Source Control Management) of the project.

Element

Type

Description

connection

String

The source control management system URL
that describes the repository and how to connect to the
repository. For more information, see the
URL format
and list of supported SCMs.
This connection is read-only.

developerConnection

String

Just like connection, but for developers, i.e. this scm connection
will not be read only.

tag

String

The tag of current code. By default, it's set to HEAD during development.Default value is: HEAD.

url

String

The URL to the project's browsable SCM repository, such as ViewVC or Fisheye.

issueManagement

Information about the issue tracking (or bug tracking) system used to manage this
project.

Element

Type

Description

system

String

The name of the issue management system, e.g. Bugzilla

url

String

URL for the issue management system used by the project.

ciManagement

The <CiManagement> element contains informations required to the
continuous integration system of the project.

Element

Type

Description

system

String

The name of the continuous integration system, e.g. continuum.

url

String

URL for the continuous integration system used by the project if it has a web
interface.

The URL of the project's download page. If not given users will be
referred to the homepage given by url.
This is given to assist in locating artifacts that are not in the repository due to
licensing restrictions.

Relocation information of the artifact if it has been moved to a new group ID
and/or artifact ID.

status

String

Gives the status of this artifact in the remote repository.
This must not be set in your local project, as it is updated by
tools placing it in the reposiory. Valid values are: none (default),
converted (repository manager converted this from an Maven 1 POM),
partner
(directly synced from a partner Maven 2 repository), deployed (was deployed from a Maven 2
instance), verified (has been hand verified as correct and final).

repository

Repository contains the information needed for deploying to the remote
repository.

Element

Type

Description

uniqueVersion

boolean

Whether to assign snapshots a unique version comprised of the timestamp and
build number, or to use the same version each timeDefault value is: true.

A unique identifier for a repository. This is used to match the repository
to configuration in the settings.xml file, for example. Furthermore, the identifier is
used during POM inheritance and profile injection to detect repositories that should be merged.

name

String

Human readable name of the repository.

url

String

The url of the repository, in the form protocol://hostname/path.

layout

String

The type of layout this repository uses for locating and storing artifacts -
can be legacy or default.
Default value is: default.

releases

Download policy.

Element

Type

Description

enabled

String

Whether to use this repository for downloading this type of artifact. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is true.

updatePolicy

String

The frequency for downloading updates - can be
always,daily
(default),
interval:XXX
(in minutes) or
never
(only if it doesn't exist locally).

checksumPolicy

String

What to do when verification of an artifact checksum fails. Valid values are
ignore
,
fail
or
warn
(the default).

snapshots

Download policy.

Element

Type

Description

enabled

String

Whether to use this repository for downloading this type of artifact. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is true.

updatePolicy

String

The frequency for downloading updates - can be
always,daily
(default),
interval:XXX
(in minutes) or
never
(only if it doesn't exist locally).

checksumPolicy

String

What to do when verification of an artifact checksum fails. Valid values are
ignore
,
fail
or
warn
(the default).

snapshotRepository

Repository contains the information needed for deploying to the remote
repository.

Element

Type

Description

uniqueVersion

boolean

Whether to assign snapshots a unique version comprised of the timestamp and
build number, or to use the same version each timeDefault value is: true.

A unique identifier for a repository. This is used to match the repository
to configuration in the settings.xml file, for example. Furthermore, the identifier is
used during POM inheritance and profile injection to detect repositories that should be merged.

name

String

Human readable name of the repository.

url

String

The url of the repository, in the form protocol://hostname/path.

layout

String

The type of layout this repository uses for locating and storing artifacts -
can be legacy or default.
Default value is: default.

site

Contains the information needed for deploying websites.

Element

Type

Description

id

String

A unique identifier for a deployment location. This is used to match the
site to configuration in the settings.xml file, for example.

name

String

Human readable name of the deployment location.

url

String

The url of the location where website is deployed, in the form protocol://hostname/path.

relocation

Describes where an artifact has moved to. If any of the values are omitted, it is
assumed to be the same as it was before.

Element

Type

Description

groupId

String

The group ID the artifact has moved to.

artifactId

String

The new artifact ID of the artifact.

version

String

The new version of the artifact.

message

String

An additional message to show the user about the move, such as the reason.

dependencyManagement

Section for management of default dependency information for use in a group of
POMs.

(Many) The dependencies specified here are not used until they are referenced in a
POM within the group. This allows the specification of a "standard" version for a
particular dependency.

dependency

The <dependency> element contains information about a dependency
of the project.

Element

Type

Description

groupId

String

The project group that produced the dependency, e.g.
org.apache.maven.

artifactId

String

The unique id for an artifact produced by the project group, e.g.
maven-artifact.

version

String

The version of the dependency, e.g. 3.2.1. In Maven 2, this can also be
specified as a range of versions.

type

String

The type of dependency. This defaults to jar. While it
usually represents the extension on the filename of the dependency,
that is not always the case. A type can be mapped to a different
extension and a classifier.
The type often correspongs to the packaging used, though this is also
not always the case.
Some examples are jar, war, ejb-client
and test-jar.
New types can be defined by plugins that set
extensions to true, so this is not a complete list.
Default value is: jar.

classifier

String

The classifier of the dependency. This allows distinguishing two artifacts
that belong to the same POM but were built differently, and is appended to
the filename after the version. For example, jdk14 and jdk15.

scope

String

The scope of the dependency - compile, runtime,
test, system, and provided. Used to
calculate the various classpaths used for compilation, testing, and so on.
It also assists in determining which artifacts to include in a distribution of
this project. For more information, see
the
dependency mechanism.

systemPath

String

FOR SYSTEM SCOPE ONLY. Note that use of this property is discouraged
and may be replaced in later versions. This specifies the path on the filesystem
for this dependency.
Requires an absolute path for the value, not relative.
Use a property that gives the machine specific absolute path,
e.g. ${java.home}.

(Many) Lists a set of artifacts that should be excluded from this dependency's
artifact list when it comes to calculating transitive dependencies.

optional

String

Indicates the dependency is optional for use of this library. While the
version of the dependency will be taken into account for dependency calculation if the
library is used elsewhere, it will not be passed on transitively. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is false.

exclusion

The <exclusion> element contains informations required to exclude
an artifact to the project.

Element

Type

Description

artifactId

String

The artifact ID of the project to exclude.

groupId

String

The group ID of the project to exclude.

repository

A repository contains the information needed for establishing connections with
remote repository.

A unique identifier for a repository. This is used to match the repository
to configuration in the settings.xml file, for example. Furthermore, the identifier is
used during POM inheritance and profile injection to detect repositories that should be merged.

name

String

Human readable name of the repository.

url

String

The url of the repository, in the form protocol://hostname/path.

layout

String

The type of layout this repository uses for locating and storing artifacts -
can be legacy or default.
Default value is: default.

pluginRepository

A repository contains the information needed for establishing connections with
remote repository.

A unique identifier for a repository. This is used to match the repository
to configuration in the settings.xml file, for example. Furthermore, the identifier is
used during POM inheritance and profile injection to detect repositories that should be merged.

name

String

Human readable name of the repository.

url

String

The url of the repository, in the form protocol://hostname/path.

layout

String

The type of layout this repository uses for locating and storing artifacts -
can be legacy or default.
Default value is: default.

build

The <build> element contains informations required to build the project.

Element

Type

Description

sourceDirectory

String

This element specifies a directory containing the source of the project. The
generated build system will compile the source in this directory when the project is
built. The path given is relative to the project descriptor.

scriptSourceDirectory

String

This element specifies a directory containing the script sources of the
project. This directory is meant to be different from the sourceDirectory, in that its
contents will be copied to the output directory in most cases (since scripts are
interpreted rather than compiled).

testSourceDirectory

String

This element specifies a directory containing the unit test source of the
project. The generated build system will compile these directories when the project is
being tested. The path given is relative to the project descriptor.

The default goal (or phase in Maven 2) to execute when none is specified for
the project. Note that in case of a multi-module build, only the default goal of the top-level
project is relevant, i.e. the default goals of child modules are ignored. Since Maven 3,
multiple goals/phases can be separated by whitespace.

Default plugin information to be made available for reference by projects
derived from this one. This plugin configuration will not be resolved or bound to the
lifecycle unless referenced. Any local configuration for a given plugin will override
the plugin's entire definition here.

resource

This element describes all of the classpath resources associated with a project
or unit tests.

Element

Type

Description

targetPath

String

Describe the resource target path. The path is relative to the target/classes
directory (i.e. ${project.build.outputDirectory}).
For example, if you want that resource to appear in a specific package
(org.apache.maven.messages), you must specify this
element with this value: org/apache/maven/messages.
This is not required if you simply put the resources in that directory
structure at the source, however.

filtering

String

Whether resources are filtered to replace tokens with parameterised values or not.
The values are taken from the properties element and from the
properties in the files listed in the filters element. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is false.

directory

String

Describe the directory where the resources are stored. The path is relative
to the POM.

includes/include*

List<String>

(Many)
A list of patterns to include, e.g. **/*.xml.

excludes/exclude*

List<String>

(Many)
A list of patterns to exclude, e.g. **/*.xml

testResource

This element describes all of the classpath resources associated with a project
or unit tests.

Element

Type

Description

targetPath

String

Describe the resource target path. The path is relative to the target/classes
directory (i.e. ${project.build.outputDirectory}).
For example, if you want that resource to appear in a specific package
(org.apache.maven.messages), you must specify this
element with this value: org/apache/maven/messages.
This is not required if you simply put the resources in that directory
structure at the source, however.

filtering

String

Whether resources are filtered to replace tokens with parameterised values or not.
The values are taken from the properties element and from the
properties in the files listed in the filters element. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is false.

directory

String

Describe the directory where the resources are stored. The path is relative
to the POM.

includes/include*

List<String>

(Many)
A list of patterns to include, e.g. **/*.xml.

excludes/exclude*

List<String>

(Many)
A list of patterns to exclude, e.g. **/*.xml

pluginManagement

Section for management of default plugin information for use in a group of POMs.

plugin

The group ID of the plugin in the repository.Default value is: org.apache.maven.plugins.

artifactId

String

The artifact ID of the plugin in the repository.

version

String

The version (or valid range of versions) of the plugin to be used.

extensions

String

Whether to load Maven extensions (such as packaging and type handlers) from
this plugin. For performance reasons, this should only be enabled when necessary. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is false.

(Many) Additional dependencies that this project needs to introduce to the plugin's
classloader.

goals

DOM

Deprecated. Unused by Maven.

inherited

String

Whether any configuration should be propagated to child POMs. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is true.

configuration

DOM

The configuration as DOM object.

execution

The <execution> element contains informations required for the
execution of a plugin.

Element

Type

Description

id

String

The identifier of this execution for labelling the goals during the build,
and for matching executions to merge during inheritance and profile injection.Default value is: default.

phase

String

The build lifecycle phase to bind the goals in this execution to. If omitted,
the goals will be bound to the default phase specified in their metadata.

goals/goal*

List<String>

(Many) The goals to execute with the given configuration.

inherited

String

Whether any configuration should be propagated to child POMs. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is true.

configuration

DOM

The configuration as DOM object.

reporting

Section for management of reports and their configuration.

Element

Type

Description

excludeDefaults

String

If true, then the default reports are not included in the site generation.
This includes the reports in the "Project Info" menu. Note: While the type
of this field is String for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually
Boolean. Default value is false.

outputDirectory

String

Where to store all of the generated reports. The default is
${project.build.directory}/site
.

plugin

The <plugin> element contains informations required for a report plugin.

Element

Type

Description

groupId

String

The group ID of the reporting plugin in the repository.Default value is: org.apache.maven.plugins.

artifactId

String

The artifact ID of the reporting plugin in the repository.

version

String

The version of the reporting plugin to be used.

inherited

String

Whether the configuration in this plugin should be made available to projects
that inherit from this one. Note: While the type of this field is String
for technical reasons, the semantic type is actually Boolean.
Default value is true.

Default dependency information for projects that inherit from this one. The
dependencies in this section are not immediately resolved. Instead, when a POM derived
from this one declares a dependency described by a matching groupId and artifactId, the
version and other values from this section are used for that dependency if they were not
already specified.

(Many)
This element describes all of the dependencies associated with a
project.
These dependencies are used to construct a classpath for your
project during the build process. They are automatically downloaded from the
repositories defined in this project.
See the
dependency mechanism for more information.

This element includes the specification of report plugins to use
to generate the reports on the Maven-generated site.
These reports will be run when a user executes mvn site.
All of the reports will be included in the navigation bar for browsing.

activation

The conditions within the build runtime environment which will trigger the
automatic inclusion of the build profile.

Element

Type

Description

activeByDefault

boolean

If set to true, this profile will be active unless another profile in this
pom is activated using the command line -P option or by one of that profile's
activators.Default value is: false.

jdk

String

Specifies that this profile will be activated when a matching JDK is detected.
For example, 1.4 only activates on JDKs versioned 1.4,
while !1.4 matches any JDK that is not version 1.4.

Specifies that this profile will be activated based on existence of a file.

os

This is an activator which will detect an operating system's attributes in order
to activate its profile.

Element

Type

Description

name

String

The name of the operating system to be used to activate the profile. This must be an exact match
of the ${os.name} Java property, such as Windows XP.

family

String

The general family of the OS to be used to activate the profile, such as
windows or unix.

arch

String

The architecture of the operating system to be used to activate the
profile.

version

String

The version of the operating system to be used to activate the
profile.

property

This is the property specification used to activate a profile. If the value field
is empty, then the existence of the named property will activate the profile, otherwise it
does a case-sensitive match against the property value as well.

Element

Type

Description

name

String

The name of the property to be used to activate a profile.

value

String

The value of the property required to activate a profile.

file

This is the file specification used to activate the profile. The missing value
will be the location of a file that needs to exist, and if it doesn't the profile will be
activated. On the other hand exists will test for the existence of the file and if it is
there the profile will be activated.

Element

Type

Description

missing

String

The name of the file that must be missing to activate the
profile.

exists

String

The name of the file that must exist to activate the profile.

build

Generic informations for a build.

Element

Type

Description

defaultGoal

String

The default goal (or phase in Maven 2) to execute when none is specified for
the project. Note that in case of a multi-module build, only the default goal of the top-level
project is relevant, i.e. the default goals of child modules are ignored. Since Maven 3,
multiple goals/phases can be separated by whitespace.

Default plugin information to be made available for reference by projects
derived from this one. This plugin configuration will not be resolved or bound to the
lifecycle unless referenced. Any local configuration for a given plugin will override
the plugin's entire definition here.